Trafficking and the Baby Farms…

Just the other day a picture was posted by Women’s Rights News saying that the United Nations statistics reveal that 10 children a day are trafficked in Nigeria.  That’s Nigeria ALONE! Can you imagine how many more there are in other countries like Cambodia, Thailand and other nations where millions are impoverished?

What is utterly abhorring are stories of babies actually being “bred” so they can be sold as soon as they are born. The David Smith story about a Nigerian “baby farm” raided last June 2011 is not new. Nigeria has been identified for these “baby farms” that have become quite profitable for the “professional” criminals. “Professional” because these places are run by licensed doctors or medical practitioners who use their professional skills to “breed” babies for sale to the highest bidder.     

I went back to an old article I wrote on “baby farms” thinking it may have been the same one mentioned. It wasn’t. The story I wrote happened in 2008 but it was really no different from the July 2011 story…only the cost of the babies in 2008 was less than it was in the June 2011 raid. The pregnant mothers-to-be were kept in the so-called clinics or hospitals until they gave birth. Some had unwanted pregnancies and went to these places hoping to get an abortion but ended up being detained there against their will until they gave birth. In 2008, the mothers were paid $170 and the babies were sold from $2,500 to $3,800. Today the mothers are paid almost the same as in 2008 but the babies now cost as much as $6,400 each when sold. Lucrative? Ohhhh yes.

What is even more repulsive is that some of these girls are also molested and abused while in these clinics or hospitals. Stories of men “hired” to impregnate women in such places were also reported by the victims themselves.  Some of them who had given birth and paid after their babies were born actually came back or stayed to voluntarily be impregnated again so they can sell their babies. That’s 9 months of free food and lodging for the mother and about $170 once she gives birth. Then what? She goes hungry again when the money runs out…then gets herself impregnated again? It’s such a vicious cycle but it is happening because people are so desperate to survive and there doesn’t seem to be many options open for them.  Worse, there are people who can be so manipulative and can without conscience exploit unassuming young women who may have just approached them for assistance.   

That these manipulative people have no conscience is even putting it mildly. They’re heartless money-hungry criminals who exploit the dire state of poverty these women are in, so they could profit from them. It’s an entirely different kind of human trafficking but trafficking nevertheless. The women are abused, raped, impregnated, many kept against their will until they give birth and paid an insultingly low fee. To say that these women may have also been used as prostitutes even while they were pregnant is not entirely impossible. These operators have total control of them while inside their so-called clinics. Some had even said they were also drugged at times and found out later that the operator had raped them.

The “baby farms” discovered in Enugu, Nigeria in 2008 and in Aba in 2011 also in Nigeria, show that the problem continues to proliferate to this day. But to say that this is happening because millions are impoverished is not entirely accurate. Many of these women are kept in these farms against their will. It exists because there are people who are willing to “feed” these criminals’ thirst for profit.  Where there are no buyers, there would be no business. But there are, and that is so tragic for the victims.  

Trafficking babies isn’t unique to Nigeria. The existence of “baby farms” has of course highlighted the situation there. But trafficking of babies happens everywhere and in many forms. I have watched a documentary where a mother with nine children would get pregnant to sell her baby. She had no qualms letting the reporter know that she had done it several times and would do it again for a fee. Others would kidnap babies to sell them to people willing to buy them.

The human world has become more and more inhuman, uncaring of others, forgetting that profit is temporary and this could all be run out, that respect and compassion for others are essential.  But how can you tell this to criminals? Trafficking is something ordinary to them…part of their business. They are so used to it that no emotions are involved when they “go about their business.”

There are several NGOs in Nigeria working with local and international authorities to arrest this problem but so much still has to be done. It is undoubtedly difficult for instance to change a people’s belief overnight, on witchcraft rituals where newborn babies are used for sacrifice. There are also childless couples who in desperation resort to adopting newborn babies, maybe not knowing that these babies were “bred” because people like them were willing to buy the babies.

There is a need to be vigilant to curb this problem and it has to be a concerted effort between the citizens and government. That is already being done now. The social and legal structures are already there that can make the change happen. It may take a while, but it can happen. It will happen…  

    

By Lylin Aguas

A baby in a ‘bar’

Two nights ago, I got an invitation for drinks from a friend, which I happily accepted because I did need a break from the multiple things I had been doing. He gave me directions of where I should meet him and I got there at about 7.20pm.

In a classic bar, you give an order to the bar tender over the counter and he whips up a drink for you or serves you a bottle. In my country, when we say “bar”, it is not in the classic sense of the word. It is more crowded, nobody mixes drinks, there is no over the counter service, the music is so loud you can’t hear yourself talk and the smoke from cigarettes just floats around in the air. I seldom go to “bars” but somehow found myself in this one.

My friend came out to meet me when I got there and took me to his table where he already had a friend sitting. And then I saw it. There was a young lady sitting across from us with a baby. That baby could not have been more than two and a half months old (I have three nephews and a niece so I would know). I was overcome with a mixture of reactions. I was shocked, overwhelmed, mortified, a little annoyed and then sorry. Shocked because children below 18 years old are not generally allowed into places like this, overwhelmed because a nursing mother and her baby were actually sitting there, mortified because they were allowed in, angry at the mother for exposing a child to the multiple things happening in a bar and then sorry. Sorry, first, for the mother because she obviously didn’t know better and probably had nobody to school her. Sorry too for the child, the beautiful innocent baby who is born into such a situation.

I told my friend how uncomfortable I was because of the baby. He told me he is “used to it” because it was not an unusual sight. He likes to explore and has been to more than a few bars so it was not the first time and would certainly not be the last. Later on, when I shared this experience with other friends, they told me of other cases they themselves had seen. One of my friends said she had seen a one year old in the bar whose mother gaily stated that her son seemed to like ‘Guinness’ (an alcoholic beverage). I was more than a little disturbed since this incident. I still am. The question which has been hunting me since then is why would anybody allow a baby in a bar?

A baby in a bar to me is a strong indication of social decadence. It may not be a defined criminal offense around here but some things should not be allowed to happen. The deterioration of social values in my country is alarming. Multiple reasons could explain such social decadence. It could be as a result of dying cultural values. Worth mentioning is the fact that my country has multiple cultures (Cameroon has more than two hundred tribes). More obvious however, is the cultural difference between the English and French speaking Cameroonians. Today, people are more liberal in their approach towards life. Three to four decades ago, a young girl being pregnant out of marriage would have been so much of a disgrace to the family that the family might be tempted to hide the baby. Young girls were relegated to the domestic sphere (which is what we women are against today) but then, they were properly schooled on the dangers of unprotected sex and on how to take care of and bring up a baby. There are cultural traditional practices (like female genital mutilation, inheritance laws that leave a widow with no property, prohibition of women from acquiring and owning property etc.) which are very wrong and dehumanizing.

But not all cultural practices are bad. What we need to do is to preserve and promote those cultural practices which are healthy like the formal and informal education of the girl child.

By Doris Gweh